Unsung Hero
by Dancerslife
Summary: It's about dealing with loss, how to cope with it, and how to let someone in and let them help you.


**Disclaimer: These are not my characters. Just my story idea. **

I published a full story a while back. I didn't like it so I took it down. I apologize. If you'd like to read it let me know.

I think this is a better way to go about the story anyway. It doesn't need all the other stuff.

Without further ado. Please read and review.

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><p><em><span>Bell one <span>_

_She grips his hand. She was at home when the first Tower was hit. Everyone stopped. No one knew what was going on. She had just gotten out of the shower. Saw her phone had a voicemail. She went to him. _

_He had just dropped off his daughter. He was going to a meeting for his next book. He was in the car when his phone went dead. He had to go home to get the charger He was going to the site when he saw people running to the closest television. He was mesmerized by the site that he didn't hear his phone ring. He didn't know someone had been calling him about his daughter. _

_She walked. She walked towards her father and ended up in a mob of people. Her cheeks were cut by gravel. Her knees skidded from throwing herself to the ground. The wall was her hiding place; she was in plain view. No one stopped. She cried through the dirt, her tear marks making their way through the grime that was building up on her cheeks. She saw the dark haired woman running towards her, past her, and then stop. She was just trying to see her father. _

_Bell two_

_She was in her car. Driving as fast as she could out of the area, far away from them. It wasn't going to happen easy. She had hit redial so many times she had lost count. The father wasn't answering. The girl had no one else. It was starting to make her worry. For a brief moment she thought that the father had already made it into the building and the father was gone. That was until her phone rang. She couldn't have answered quicker. _

_He called the number that called him number of times. He thought it was Paula wondering where the hell he was. But there was a plane in the building she worked in. He was jumping in his car, yelling at the driver to go to te precinct, the one the detective had told him about. He was to go there. Alexis was there. She was okay. She was going to be fine. He was stuck in traffic. _

_She was in the woman's lap. The woman who found her and saved her. It wasn't something she would do on a normal day. Her father told her never to talk to strangers, but this one seemed to be a good person. She didn't want to say anything. But the pretty lady got her to. She was a big girl. Big girls weren't afraid. But Alexis Castle had never been so frightened. _

Katherine Beckett had moved up the ranks to detective fairly quickly. She was in the game. Nothing was going to break her. Nothing was allowed to break her. That was until her mother's case was open for the second time and she almost lost her life. Castle had been there for her. For her mother's case, her shooting, and for her recuperation. That was until she pushed him away and escaped to her father's cabin for three months.

She had just gotten back when she saw the white envelope with her name scrolled on the front. It was to inform her that she and her family were invited to view the finished memorial. To pay respect for her lost one. It was two months before she had been shot that they called her and asked where she would like his name to be placed. She couldn't think of a place, or with whom, so she just said the people he passed away with.

Kate gasped at the pair of arms that wormed their way around her waist. She placed her hands on the top of the heavy ones that were resting on her stomach. Kate took a deep breath and relaxed, her head falling back against his shoulder. Rick had been there through some of the toughest times in her life. She was more than relieved that he threatened to take her there himself if she didn't allow him to go with her. She needed it.

_Bell Three_

_She had seen the images afterwards. She hadn't seen the tower fall. She was too busy making sure Alexis was safe. She had gotten the girl whatever she wanted. Cookies from the snack machine. Hot cocoa from the little café down the street. Kate was doing whatever she could to get Alexis's mind off not knowing where her father was. _

_Martha had called him time and time again. He was stuck in traffic. Everyone wanted out of New York. They wanted to get to a better place, in their homes, out of the state; anywhere that was safe. He was forced to shut off the radio. He was tired of hearing the reports that people were jumping out of buildings. He was tired of hearing about the people who had run in and tried to save people. He didn't hear about the first tower falling. _

_She was worried. She didn't talk to her dad. She wanted to. She wanted to be in school like she was supposed to. She wouldn't have been here if she stayed in school like she was supposed to. She hadn't even stepped into the school, just waited behind a tree until her dad's car was out of sight and made her way to the meeting. It was going to be a surprised. _

_Bell Four_

_It was the thing she had seen over Alexis's head. The building was leveling itself; the structure was no longer capable of holding itself up. People were to be trapped inside. Lives were being lost in the matter of seconds. As she held the girl to her, the girl who had come to a conclusion that her father was hurt and cried, Kate shielded the girl from the destruction behind her. _

_He had seen it on the television screen in traffic. The only thing that was keeping him calm was Alexis was in the police's custody. She was fine. She wasn't near the towers, farther away than that. And that put him at ease. If she was hurt he would deal with it. If she needed to go to therapy he'd get the best one. He just was pleased that she wasn't down there dead. _

_She felt her squeeze. She felt her body tense and she just wanted to turn her head. But she could see what was happening on another television screen across the bullpen. There was smoke. A lot of smoke. And her dad was supposed to be in there. In that group of people. Kate said she talked to him and that he was to be there soon. Soon had come and gone and they were still there. She just wanted to go home. _

Alexis was seven years old. She was in second grade when it happened. The school hadn't called saying she was absent; people there assumed she was with her father because of the attacks. No one had seen her getting dropped off. She never did a thing like that again.

Alexis saw the children who were standing there, kids who lost their fathers, mothers, both parents and were living with another family member. It was saddening. These kids only knew that their parents were killed because a plane flew into the building that they worked in. Planes weren't safe. Buildings higher than five floors weren't safe.

And then there were kids who were too young. And probably would never know what happened ten years ago. Their parents, not all parents, wouldn't talk about the attacks. It wasn't something to talk about. It was too painful. Not everyone had been saved like she had. Kate saved her. Saved her father from insanity. In Alexis's eyes, she was a hero.

Kate watched as Alexis drug her hand over the names of those who had passed. The older woman placed a hand on her shoulder, getting her to stop. Alexis looked up at Kate, smiled and then dropped it. Both pairs of eyes were brimming with tears; it was overwhelming.

"This is our day, kid." Kate smiled. "This is our day."

"What do you mean?"

"I met you today. It was today my life changed in a different way. I would be a doctor's wife, I wouldn't be a cop, if today didn't happen. I would have met you and your dad."

"Today's a sad day."

"Today is a sad day. But a happy day. Someone right now is having a baby. And all their friends won't know what happened. Their kids won't know what happened today, because it wasn't beaten into their brains that we were attacked." Kate said. "We'll get through today one step at a time. One year after another. It's one day out of three hundred and sixty five."

"Will you be here next year?"

"I think so. If your dad will have me."

"I don't think he'll let you go." Alexis admitted after a moment of silence. "I don't think he'll be able to live with himself if he lets you go again."

Kate tucked a strand of red hair behind Alexis's ear and smiled at the girl. Kate watched this girl grow. Stayed up at night while she wrote out her college admissions essays. Woke early to meet her at a coffee shop and listen to her rant and rave about boys and the colleges that might or might not accept her. Alexis was her father's daughter. The girl loved to tell stories. She loved to talk.

Speaking of her father, Rick was talking to someone, shaking their hands and bending down to a little boy, ruffling his hair. The boy laughed. Kate smiled. Rick's eyes met hers and excused himself, coming over and wrapping an arm around Kate's waist. She didn't ask. She didn't dare to. He would tell her later on. It's how the worked. It was their way of not killing each other. They trusted each other.

Rick took them home. It had become too much for her. She didn't want to admit it, but he could see it in her face. In the way she was looking at things, her eyes were glazed over, her train of thought elsewhere. Even with a light touch she'd jump, gasp, and smile just to cover it up. He picked up on things like that and it drove her crazy.

After writing a chapter of his latest novel, Rick went in search of Kate. He found her on the balcony. She was curled up on the wicker chair that sat there; her head in her hand, her eyes trained on the skyline of New York. It was a breath taking sight. Both the skyline and Kate.

"Never in a million years, did I think this would happen." It was a vague statement but he had to agree. He pushed her forward and climbed into the chair behind her.

Together they stared at the lights that shot off into the sky, the places where the twin towers should have been. Where the lives of those who lost were remembered.


End file.
